


Three Can Keep a Secret

by Cornerofmadness



Series: Price of Grief [1]
Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Betrayal, Blood and Gore, Faked Suicide, Gen, Major Character Injury, Medical Conditions, Medical Procedures, Whump, Wounds, loss of friendship, nearly cried writing it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-23
Updated: 2021-01-23
Packaged: 2021-03-14 17:46:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28924554
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cornerofmadness/pseuds/Cornerofmadness
Summary: Malcolm has burned all his bridges but that’s not the worst of his problems. The secret is killing him.
Series: Price of Grief [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2149635
Comments: 8
Kudos: 51





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> **Disclaimer:** Not mine, Chris Fedak and Sam Sklaver owns it
> 
>  **Notes:** Written for the allbingo prompt “burning bridges.” It’s not a secret I am not at all thrilled with how the Endicott story line was handled but it did allow for this canon divergence (based on how we saw Ainsley acting all last season and on whether or not she really can’t remember or is she as manipulative as daddy dearest).

Malcolm pressed his belly against the edge of the interrogation table. His hands shook and his leg jumped. There was no way out of this. He’d known that the moment he chose to help his sister. Had he thought it out better, there would have been other paths to follow. Drop his mother’s gun on Endicott and then Ainsley would have saved him from imminent threat of death. Yes, she had sliced more than once but it wouldn’t be the first time that had happened in a case of self-defense.

He'd panicked. His only instinct had been to save his sister. He should never have told his father but who better to walk him through it? Endicott had to disappear. Only he hadn’t done a good enough job of hiding the body. Malcolm thought he’d been so very clever in that respect and yet somehow, Endicott’s remains had been found in scant months. In retrospect, his father had displayed his kills, earned his moniker, and enjoyed the terror those displayed bodies generated. He should have taken his lead from Watkins who hid bodies for twenty years.

What did it matter now, trapped as he was in this gray room? It was all over. He’d failed. Now it only mattered if he could save Ainsley. He was already done for. Malcom didn’t need to see Gil to know that but when Gil entered the room, the pain of seeing his ersatz father’s face destroyed him. Malcolm caught a sob in his throat, causing pain to flare.

“Gil…,” he managed to grate out past his fear-frozen throat.

“Stop. Just stop.” Gil thrust his hands out. “I can’t help you, Malcolm. There is nothing I can do.”

The pain and anger in Gil’s voice shredded Malcolm. He swallowed hard. He’d known that. No one could save him from what awaited. The best he could do was keep his mouth shut but it was hard. He wanted to unburden himself. He needed to confess but Malcolm also expected some sympathy from Gil. Instead, his dark eyes were like obsidian, hard and sharp.

“Gil,” he whispered, jumping when Gil slammed a hand down on the table.

“Why, Malcolm? Why?”

“I had to protect her. I _had_ to!”

Gil shook his head, dragging a chair over to Malcolm, too close, closer than a detective ever should sit to a suspect. “You _dismembered_ Endicott,” he whispered in Malcolm’s ear so low even he barely heard Gil.

“There was no choice.”

“But you didn’t kill him,” Gil’s voice remained low; no recording equipment could possibly catch it.

“I _did_ ,” he protested feebly. Gil saw through his lies just as he almost always did, ever since Malcolm was a little kid trying to get away with some nonsense.

“Don’t insult us. You should have done a better job of disposal. We have his parts. The slashes don’t match your height, almost but not quite. Ainsley must have had her heels on.”

Malcolm stared at the table, his hand trembling far beyond his control. “Gil…”

“Shut up. Let me talk.” Gil yanked Malcolm closer and echoed Malcolm’s earlier thought. “Why didn’t you just put your mother’s gun on him and claim imminent threat and justifiable homicide?”

“Would my family have gotten away with that twice?”

“What twice? Your father was punished for murder not self-defense, maybe he wasn’t punished as much as anyone would have wanted but he didn’t get away with it.”

Malcolm’s breath hitched as Gil split that hair. The room spun. He fought to hold onto consciousness. “Endicott had powerful friends.”

“And your mother can afford the best, most powerful lawyers in the country. And the local courts are tripping over themselves to get distance from Endicott. Damn it, kid.” Gil shoved back from him. He jumped out of his chair so fast, he nearly knocked it over. “You’ve burned every bridge you have. Every last _damn_ one of them.”

“Gil,” he whimpered for the third time, pushing his shaking hand forward, but Gil stayed out of reach.

“All the bridges, Bright. Even Edrisa isn’t on your side after this.”

The look in Gil’s eyes said he didn’t have Malcolm’s back either. It was killing the man but he couldn’t support Malcolm anymore. He stomped back over to Malcolm and grabbed his shoulder. Gil leaned in and said, “You didn’t even hide the body well. How could you be so sloppy?”

“I tried…”

“You failed everyone.”

Malcolm squeezed his eyes shut. Gil had never been this cruel to him. That exposed the depth of Gil’s feelings of betrayal and pain. The room whirled again. Malcolm heaved but didn’t throw up. This had to be a dream, just like when he saw Ainsley as a nun. This wasn’t real. Gil wouldn’t throw him to the wolves. Gil would always try to save him, wouldn’t he? _No_ whispered his inner demons, _no one is going to protect you after what you did._

Ignoring that voice, Malcolm willed himself to wake up because this had to be a night terror. He wouldn’t survive it if it were reality. When he opened his eyes, he saw the horrid but compelling Goya painting on his wall. Dani hated that thing. He would never be able to speak to her again, not if his loft was the dream and he was in the interrogation room still, not if he was in the middle of a psychotic break and none of this was real. He couldn’t tell what was reality. His head felt thick, stuffed with cotton. He’d been drugged. He’d suffered through sedation so many times; he knew what it made his body feel like.

“Oh, you woke up. Damn, brother, you really do have a tolerance for sedatives,” Ainsley huffed, annoyed.

Malcolm turned his head, tracking her voice. The room spun like a tilt-a-whirl. Why was he so lightheaded? The edges of his vision flittered. Was this a dream reality? No, he could smell the Earl Grey tea he’d been drinking earlier with his sister, caught the scent of something metallic. He never really had a sense of smell in his dreams. “Sedative?” he asked with a tongue so thick it could be a salami. Malcolm knew he’d been sedated but he couldn’t believe Ainsley was the source of it. She _knew_ how he hated being trapped in his dreams.

“You overdosed,” she replied, stepping into full view.

A chill raced up his spine. That was their father’s smile on her face, the cold, wicked one.

“Over….” The words couldn’t come out. His mouth, dry and coated, seemed out of control. He wouldn’t have overdosed himself. Malcolm lifted his hand, questing for the pill bottles, which were on the table next to him. They weren’t supposed to be in his living room. Blood forged a path toward them. Malcolm’s lips quivered as he turned his shaking hands upright, barely able to do it. Deep slashes split his left wrist open deep to the tendons. The cuts in the right wrist were shallower but still pouring blood. It pooled around him and at his feet rested one of his steak knives which no doubt would have his prints on it.

“Honestly, I thought you wouldn’t wake up, that it would be peaceful for you.” Ainsley sighed, deeply disappointed in him.

“Ains…what?” He reached out to her, making the blood flow faster. Malcolm withdrew his arms. He flexed his wrists and pressed them to his sides to stem the bleeding.

She squatted down to look him in the eye, careful to stay out of the blood. “What do you mean what? Or do you mean why?”

Malcolm struggled to catch his breath, his vision dimmed. He nodded. Pain blossomed in him as his heart pounded. Oxygen deprived tissues screamed for relief.

Ainsley laughed, spinning away from him. “I can’t remember what happened. There’s a gap. You’re the best brother for protecting me,” she said in an innocent voice. Ainsley’s eyes hardened. “Honestly, brother, do you take me for an idiot? Even if I didn’t remember, and I didn’t for a little while, do you think I’m so clueless that I wouldn’t wonder why you were as clean as an operating room while I was soaked in blood? How dumb do you think I am? You couldn’t have killed Endicott and be blood-free. I did it.”

“Ains….” He couldn’t form any thoughts. He’d been wrong, so very wrong. Their father had it right when he proclaimed, ‘my girl!’ The pain inside him ratcheted up several notches.

“Dad and I have been talking ever since my head cleared. You’re a weak link, Malcolm. It took Dad a long time to finally admit it. Do you know how much misogyny I had to wade through to move him off making you the center of his world, his _heir_.” Ainsley rolled her eyes. “Once he did, he strung you along. ‘Protect your sister, Malcolm. Admit you enjoyed cutting Endicott up. You’re just like me!’ Dad took it too far though. Instead of binding you to us, you broke under the pressure. Besides, I killed Endicott. It was the most powerful moment in my life. You tried to steal that,” she snarled.

“Protecting you,” he managed, his head bobbling.

“Oh, I know. It’s sweet really.” Ainsley circled behind him and stroked his hair tenderly. “And if I could have trusted you, I would have left it at that. But you’re coming undone. Everyone sees it.” She repositioned herself so she could stare him in the eyes. “I remembered what Ben Franklin said, three can keep a secret if two of them are dead.”

Malcolm’s heart flailed like a trapped bird. He was dying and not just from the blood loss. His sister was something he had been blind to. His father stood before him. Ainsley had inherited the ‘gift’ his father wished Malcolm had had. The agony born of blood loss gripped him so tight he nearly missed what Ainsley said next.

“I didn’t want it to come to this, Malcolm, but the guilt was destroying you. Eventually you’d have confessed, and I wasn’t going to let you do to me what you did to Dad. It was only a matter of time.” Ainsley’s eyes glistened as if she actually felt something for him, as if she could cry for him. Maybe she did. Sociopaths did have emotions and just like their father, she could turn them off and on.

“D-d-dad,” he stammered, words so thick in his mouth he could barely get them out.

“Yes, he knows too much too. He’ll be shattered when he hears about you. He and I have been having tea time. The administrators don’t mind me bringing him a treat or two. Did you know that?” Ainsley smiled. “A man who used to poison his victims with tea. Ironic, isn’t it? I have a special tea made for him, mixed liberally with foxglove. I’m sure I don’t have to tell you what that’ll do to him. He’s older now, heartbroken over his son’s suicide and his heart just gave out.”

Malcolm shivered as she grinned, her eyes alive with an inner light.

“Mom will never bother to have an autopsy. She wants him dead and cremated. No one will question a middle-aged, sedentary man having a heart attack.”

Ainsley scrubbed a hand under her eyes. She kissed his forehead. “I really wished you had stayed unconscious through it all, Malcolm. It would have been so much easier. I can’t do this. I can’t watch you die while you’re looking at me and suffering. It looks so painful.”

“Don’t do this,” he begged with his failing strength. “Save…”

“You? And have you betray me? You have never been at peace, Malcolm. It killed me watching you suffering for so long. You’ll have that peace now. You’ll _finally_ be able to rest.”

With that Ainsley left him there to bleed out. Malcolm struggled with his numb fingers to get his phone. She had been so sure he’d stay unconscious that she had forgotten about his phone. Malcolm managed to dial before the world quieted into darkness.

**Author’s Note:** I was going to just leave it there ambiguous as to if he died or not but then remembered I personally hate open endings like that so I decided to make it chose your own ending. If you are pro-MCD, go to chapter two. If you need Malcolm to live go to chapter three. Or read both and decide which you like better.


	2. Major Character Death

Chapter Two

Ainsley sat in the park, letting the sun bake her. It had been too long since she felt warm, felt like herself. She extended a hand to the sun, watching it catch the gem in her new ring, refracting the light. It was a beautiful little stone, a synthetic ‘red diamond’ made from Malcolm’s ashes. Mom had hers as a sapphire diamond saying it reminded her of her baby’s eyes.

Letting her hand drop, Ainsley scowled. Her mother was broken now beyond repair. Mom remained blind as ever, never suspecting a thing. She was more often too drunk and benzoed out to care. Ainsley wondered if she would survive the year. Oddly, she hated that. She didn’t want her mother to go too.

She trailed a finger over the gem that had once been her brother. How could human ashes become something so beautiful? Mother had divvied Malcolm into thirds: a ring for Ainsley, one of her and a beautiful, little, blue glass sculpture for Gil who went to his knees weeping when they gave it to him.

_Why couldn’t I trust you, Malcolm? You were breaking under the weight of our secret. It shouldn’t have come to this. I miss you._

She missed him more than she expected. On the other hand, Ainsley missed her father less than she thought. She let him suffer for weeks after Malcolm passed. Dad had made it easy to give him the foxglove-laced tea with all his moaning about everything being over with the loss of Malcolm. He never saw her potential. Even after she killed Endicott – and he damn well knew it and admitted that she had a killer instinct – he kept telling her she wasn’t made for it not like Malcolm was, that her brother would protect her. Both of them knew that was a lie. Malcolm had too much empathy. Malcolm couldn’t handle the secret he was keeping. It was killing him and now he was released from that agony.

Two men looking out for her as if she needed protecting, she grimaced. Ainsley brought up the memory of her father’s terrified eyes as his heart slowed down and went into an arrhythmia under the potent effects of the foxglove’s alkaloids. He _knew_ he was dying and more importantly he knew exactly who had killed him. Maybe in those last moments he finally valued her. Ainsley hadn’t let Mom throw him down a public toilet like she promised. He was in an urn in Ainsley’s place. Being a beautiful gem seemed a little too good for him. 

He really should have loved her more.

Ainsley pried herself up. With a final glance at her ring, she slipped her hands into her pockets and walked toward the park’s fountain. It was going to be a good day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author’s Note – Foxglove is the natural source of digitalis, which is both a heart medicine and a potent poison. It’s all a matter of dosage. Yes, you can in fact have your loved one turned into a diamond. One such company is[ Life Gem](http://lifegem.com/) There are also multiple companies that will turned your loved one’s ashes (or your pet’s) into glass sculptures and jewelry such as [ this one](https://www.spiritpieces.com/pages/cremation-ashes-into-glass)


	3. Major Character Death Narrrowly Avoided

Chapter Three

Malcolm shuddered as he waited at a table in a mental hospital, memories of his time at Harvard dancing in his head. It was a room like this where he used to meet his father back then. Months had passed since Ainsley left him to die. He very nearly did. While he was in a medically induced coma battling to stay alive, Ainsley had been committed for her crimes. He should have realized their mother could manage it, or maybe he should say she’d hire a lawyer capable of cobbling together a deal.

He ran a thumb over the deep scarring on his left wrist. Malcolm purposely wore short sleeves. He wanted Ainsley to see what she had done to him. But would she care? She hadn’t contacted him but Malcolm learned it was because his mother had disconnected his phone and got him a new one. The only people who had that number were her and Gil. Eventually Malcolm gave it to a few others but not his sister nor his father. He needed to cut them out of his life but not before he saw Ainsley one last time.

When her handler brought her in and chained her to the table – again memories of his teen years and their father sprang to mind – Ainsley looked as good as their father did in his confinement. Ainsley’s eyes were slightly vacant – maybe they had her on something strong – but she was still cool and beautiful. He scratched absently at the rash on his upper arm, studying her. Fear wormed into his heart.

Shockingly Ainsley smiled when she saw him. “It’s good to see you, Malcolm,” she said without preamble.

“Is it really?”

“Of course, it is.” Ainsley reached out to take his hands but he pushed back from the table as if it burst into flames. Her face crumpled. “Malcolm.”

He held up both hands, letting them tremble, showing her all the scars she’d left him with. The plastic surgeon said they could try to reduce the scarring later when he was more likely to survive another surgery. What did it matter? He’d already lost everything. What did he care that his wrists were a maze of scars? “No touching,” he said.

Ainsley pouted at him, that put out expression she always got when he wouldn’t let her have her way growing up. “You don’t need to be like that.”

“Really?” Hysteria tinged his voice. “You overdosed me, slit my wrists and left me to die.”

“And yet here you are. You know why I had to do it. I _had_ to protect myself.” Ainsley glanced around her psychiatric jail. “It should have worked.”

“Oh, it worked. You’re here in a relatively comfortable hospital and not in prison,” he said. 

“How did _you_ not go to prison? Mother wouldn’t tell me. She rarely visits and all she talks about is _you_?” Ainsley curled her lip. “She’s so much like Dad in that respect but she’d burst if I said that.” 

“I was convicted of accessory after the fact and gross abuse of a corpse. Since they decided on manslaughter for you, I was only sentenced to a year, but was granted that as time served because you already put me in a prison,” he said, cold as he still felt, mentally, spiritually, physically. He hadn’t been warm since it happened.

“You always were so dramatic.” Ainsley rolled her eyes, and then cocked her head to the side, gazing at him. “You do look terrible. All gray and puffy. And did you get into some poison ivy?” She gestured to the rash on his arm. “Still not sleeping?”

“What do you think?” he snarled. Malcolm stood and lifted his shirt. Ainsley widened her eyes, seeing the plastic tubing taped to his side, penetrating his belly. A red ring of irritation surrounded the catheter. “You gave me enough pills to kill me. You left me in hypovolemic shock. My kidneys failed. I’m slowly regaining function in them but they might never recover enough for me to get off peritoneal dialysis.” He flicked a finger against the catheter tubing. “I might need a transplant. I’m gray and puffy because what’s left of my kidneys can’t properly remove fluids from my body. The rash is from kidney failure. My skin is always so dry and itching non-stop. The itch and the rash are from the toxins my kidneys can’t clear from my body.”

Malcolm pulled his shirt down, retaking his seat. Ainsley cast her gaze down, actually looking penitent. 

“I didn’t mean for that to happen.”

“No, you meant for me to die,” he said quietly. “I would have protected you, Ainsley, to the end but you didn’t trust me. I would never have given you up. I’d have told them I killed Endicott because it should have been me who did.”

“You rant in your sleep. You’d have told someone inadvertently if nothing else. One of my sources in the department told me Dani had to approach you in body armor because of your nightmares in the precinct. You would have betrayed me.”

“You ended up betraying yourself. Now you’re here probably for life because of your attempt on my life and the foxglove tea they found at your place. My life’s so destroyed the judge took pity on me. He didn’t like my chances of surviving in prison for helping to cover up what you did to Endicott, not with my kidneys like this.”

“At least that worked out for you.” She flipped back her hair.

He laughed bitter as bile. “Really? Did it? I have no job. I can never work as a profiler again even if I do recover. I can’t teach at John Jay or Harvard and train the next round of profilers because who would hire a professor who dismembered someone?”

“Malcolm…”

“Maybe I could be a psychologist at Claremont. I have something in common with them, after all,” he growled, his hand shaking. “Instead, I sit at home all day watching Mom drink herself to death over what we’ve done. Gil comes by sometimes but things are broken between us. I’m not sure it will ever be repaired. Dani and JT came to see me while I was still in the hospital but I told them to forget me. I don’t want them to have to deal with everything they have to on the force and have my friendship sinking them like an anchor. Even Edrisa doesn’t know what to say to me anymore. Vijay has called a couple times. So, you _have_ killed me, Ainsley. You killed everything that made me, me. This is just a shell.” He thumped his chest and then poked himself in the forehead. “I’ve forgotten a lot of things now too. The hypovolemic shock gave me a traumatic brain injury.”

Her eyes widened at that, color draining at her face. “But you’re…you are so smart, so quick, it’s your best feature.”

“Not anymore. I’m hoping my memory will get better, like my kidneys. Maybe once I don’t have toxins building up inside me…” Malcolm’s lip quivered. “Speaking of which, I have to go now Ainsley. Do you know what it’s like to lie there while liters of glucose water drains into your gut? To leave sloshing around inside you for hours while it filters the poisons out of you? That’s my life now. Maybe it’ll get better. Maybe it won’t. All I know is I wanted to see you in person to say goodbye, Ainsley. I don’t think I’ll be visiting again.”

She widened her eyes, shocked. “Malcolm, you can’t mean that.”

He pushed back from the table, shielding his eyes from her. He didn’t want her to see him cry. “Goodbye, Ainsley. Maybe I can forgive you some day but that’s not today.”

Malcolm ignored his sister’s cries, her entreaties for him to stay. Did she want him for him or like their father, wanted him there in so much as he helped to define them and their egos? The thought made his head pound. Malcolm slowly made his way to the front entrance. Gil waited in the lobby. Things were broken between them, that was true, but Gil hadn’t given up on him.

He put a hand on Malcolm’s back and guided him out to the car. Malcolm broke down into wracking sobs before he could get inside. Gil pulled him into a strong embrace and Malcolm held on for dear life. Nothing would be right again but here in this moment he was safe if only for the briefest of moments. It was the only solace left to him and he held on tight.


End file.
